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Business Stationary Mart - The Selfish Gene: 30th Anniversary Edition--with a new Introduction by the Author
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List Price: $19.99
Our Price: $8.93
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Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 576.5
EAN: 9780199291151
ISBN: 0199291152
Label: Oxford University Press, USA
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 384
Publication Date: 2006-05-25
Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA
Studio: Oxford University Press, USA
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Summary: The Right Perspective for Biology and Evolution
Comment: This book puts the body of knowledge in evolutionary biology in the right perspective. Because we are macro beings, because we in this society live and deal at organism level, so we tend to believe that everything revolves around this level. What this book does is to encourage you to think form the perspective of molecular level, the gene's level. After all, they came first in the tree of evolutiona nd they also come first in building the organisms...
PLIUS it's a good read.
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Summary: I think Dawkins is wrong in his central argument. Here's why:
Comment: The first thing I want to say is how much respect I have for Richard Dawkins as a scientist, as a teacher, as a writer of fascinating prose, and as a person. He is a brilliant and courageous man who works hard to bring his knowledge and insights to all of us. For the record I have read six of his books and reviewed four of them. They are:
The God Delusion (2006)
The Ancestor's Tale: A Pilgrimage to the Dawn of Evolution (2004)
A Devil's Chaplain: Reflections on Hope, Lies, Science, and Love (2003)
The Extended Phenotype: The Long Reach of the Gene (1982; 1999)
The second thing I want to say is that The Selfish Gene is one of the landmark science books of the 20th century, and so I am pleased to see this 30th Anniversary Edition (from 2006) with a new introduction by Dawkins and some new footnotes.
Rather than review the book as a whole, however, as has been done many times, in this review I want to concentrate on the central issue of the book, namely the question of "at what level does natural selection work?"
Dawkins believes that the environment selects certain genes, or more properly speaking, suites of genes and therefore operates primarily at the level of the gene. I disagree and believe this is like saying that the public selects certain letters, or words, or sentences of words when buying a book. The words (or more properly the ideas represented by the words) are the reason the public selects a book, but what the public selects is nonetheless the book. Genes are like ideas in books. Ideas must appear in some medium, even if it is just word of mouth. Genes must appear in organisms, which are the products of both the genetic instructions and the environment in which they develop. Consequently genes help to produce individuals (or in the case of social insects, a group of individuals that can be seen as a single organism). Dawkins calls these individuals "survival machines." In turn the environment selects certain survival machines that contain certain genes.
Another way of expressing this is to say that the environment selects genes by proxy, that is, through the medium of the individual phenotype. The environment cannot directly affect the genes since the genes are safely encapsulated within the survival machine which does not in any Lamackian way communicate with them. The exception is when an electromagnetic particle hits the code and alters it, creating a mutation. The environment does not act on that altered code; instead it acts upon the individual that is born to carry that altered code or lack thereof.
The individual gene itself (if we can speak of such a thing which is just a section of code) doesn't work in isolation. It is always allied for better or for worse with other sections of code. Certain sections of code are reproduced again and again because they are handy or work well with other sections of code in a way that allows the survival machine to reproduce and its offspring to reproduce. But the environment cannot select certain selections of code. It can only select the individual containing that code (and a lot of other code besides). In fact, it cannot just select the individual, it must select its possible mates and even much of its environment as well, such as the plants and animals it uses for food and shelter. To speak of selecting genes or even individual organisms is just a convenient way of talking.
What is really selected is a group of organisms of some kind. Some consider an important group selected by the environment to be the species or the ecology. Giving a large enough perspective, I would go so far as to say (going beyond Lovecock and Gaia) that natural selection operates on the level of life itself.
Another point is that the genes never reproduce themselves by themselves. Nothing in this world that I know of actually reproduces itself by itself, except dividing cells, and they do this only most of the time. As is now known, occasionally bacteria trade genes with other bacteria and thereby reproduce not quite exact copies of themselves. A strand of DNA is replicated with the help of the machinery of the cell. Viruses need cells to replicate themselves. Anything that was one hundred percent effective in making exact copies of itself would not undergo Darwinian evolution and would in fact have died out long ago. The dreaded grey goo of nanobots replicating until they cover the earth is still just a fantasy of science fiction.
The problem with the current understanding of evolution and natural selection is the problem of not seeing that everything is connected. Any place we draw a boundary is artificial or arbitrary. Even at the skin. Franklin M. Harold, in his book, The Way of the Cell: Molecules, Organisms and the Order of Life (2001) writes, "Organisms process matter and energy as well as information; each represents a dynamic node in a whirlpool of several currents, and self-reproduction is a property of the collective, not of genes.... DNA is a peculiar sort of software, that can only be correctly interpreted by its own unique hardware....sending aliens the genome of a cat is no substitute for sending the cat itself--complete with mice." (op cit., p. 221)
For those of you who have read Dawkins' original edition from 1976, this edition is still to be recommended, particularly for the updated bibliography and for the 66 pages of endnotes where Dawkins graciously admits errors and points to new discoveries, most interestingly that of Zahavi's "handicap principle" which goes a long ways toward explaining some "altruistic" behavior. See my Amazon review of The Handicap Principle: A Missing Piece of Darwin's Puzzle (1997) by Amotz and Avishag Zahavi.
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Summary: One of the best books I've read
Comment: Richard Dawkins's The Selfish Gene is one of the best books I've read. Its subject matter--evolution of life on earth--is important. Its writing is flawless and its points well-argued. Its conclusions are significant, controversial, and seemingly inescapable.
The Selfish Gene is not for the faint of heart. Just look at the review here titled "Fascinating, but at times I wish I could unread it"--the author thinks that Dawkins's book "presents an appallingly pessimistic view of human nature, and makes life seem utterly pointless." I don't share this reviewer's view, but I'll get to that later. Some background is necessary first.
Richard Dawkins is an evolutionary biologist at Oxford University. The Selfish Gene, his first book, was published in 1976. It has since become a classic of popular science literature. I'm not a scientist and I can't critique the scientific accuracy of Dawkins's book, but I don't need to: The Selfish Gene has been scrutinized for decades, and it has emerged mostly unscathed.
Though it does contain background material, The Selfish Gene is not an evolution text. Dawkins's goal with the book is primarily to argue for a gene-based, rather than an organism- or group-based, view of evolution. He sets out to refute the theory of "group selection," which had been popular prior to the 1970s. According to group selection, traits can spread in a population if they benefit groups, even if they are detrimental (evolutionary-fitness-wise) to individuals. So, for example, group selection implies that a trait for disinterested altruism can spread if groups of altruists are better off than groups of non-altruists.
Dawkins argues that genes, not organisms or groups, are the fundamental unit of evolution. He terms genes "selfish," a word he gives a technical meaning. A "selfish" unit of evolution is one that is selected for--that is copied through the generations--in a Darwinian selection process. A "successful" selfish unit produces many copies of itself; an unsuccessful one disappears. Dawkins does not mean, of course, that genes themselves "are" selfish. Rather he means that they affect the organisms containing them as if they are. Their effects suggest a selfish disposition.
Genes are passed on based only on their ability to influence organisms to pass them on. Their benefit to particular organisms or groups is relevant only insofar as it aids their own selfish interest. Genes must be selfish, as only those most effective at replicating themselves stick around. The "unselfish" ones all die out.
Genes are "replicators"--they create identical copies of themselves. Organisms are not--they pass only their genes to the next generation. Dawkins provides a possible story of the origin of life: in it, primitive replicators emerged in the primordial soup that was earth's surface hundreds of millions of years ago. These replicators were stable configurations of molecules that, through the laws of physics and chemistry, caused like configurations to be created around them. The copying process occasionally made mistakes, which led to a diversity of replicators. Because the replicators competed for finite resources (molecules), natural selection favored the ones that were best able to survive and reproduce. More-stable arrangements--and arrangements capable of decreasing rivals' stability--were favored. As time progressed, offensive and defensive strategies became increasingly sophisticated, and the molecular arrangements became increasingly complex.
Eventually the replicators "learned" to build bodies for themselves. Dawkins suggests that a particular strain may have "discovered" (through a mutation) how to build a wall of protein around itself. He terms these bodies "survival machines." Survival machines helped the replicators to move around, to defend themselves, and to reproduce. As the replicators grew more complex, so did their survival machines. The living things we now know--amoebas, worms, trees, racoons, humans--are all survival machines. The DNA contained in every cell is the medium for genes, which are the replicators. We are their survival machines.
So ends chapter two of The Selfish Gene. Dawkins spends most of the rest of the book elaborating on his argument and demonstrating its explanatory power in specific cases. He covers his bases well and responds to the obvious objections to his theory. I couldn't possibly do justice to the finer points of his argument in this review, and I won't try. Instead I will briefly cover a few of the points I found most interesting.
Dawkins's dismissal of group selection, which I mentioned earlier, rests largely on the concept of evolutionary stability. A behavior pattern ("strategy") that is prevalent in a population is evolutionarily stable if it cannot be displaced by an upstart strategy. Strategies for disinterested altruism--which group selection suggests could develop--are not evolutionarily stable. I'll illustrate with an example. Say that a gene "for" sitting on whatever eggs lie around is prevalent in a bird population. As long as all the members of the population possess this gene, all is well: all eggs will get sat on. However, if a mutant bird that sits on no eggs enters the population, its genes will spread rapidly: most of its eggs will get sat on (by the altruists), and it will be free to gather food and lay more. A strategy for sitting on whatever eggs lie around thus is not evolutionarily stable. (A strategy for sitting on no eggs isn't stable either.) As Dawkins shows, a strategy for sitting on only one's own eggs is stable.
Genes are in competition with one another. They "want" to propagate more of their own kind, which means that organisms with similar genes tend to have similar interests and organisms with different genes tend to have different interests. Close relatives, who share many genes in common, tend to have closely-related interests. Because parents pass half of their genes to their children, parental care isn't altruism at the gene level--genes have much to gain from influencing organisms to aid others containing them. Because parents and children do differ genetically, however, their relationship is not purely cooperative. You'd expect children to "exploit" their parents to a degree--for example, by pretending to be more hungry than they actually are--and such behavior is in fact present in nature.
Dawkins has much to say on the relationship between the sexes. He defines "males" as organisms with small and numerous sex cells (i.e., sperm) and "females" as organisms with large and few sex cells (i.e., eggs). Because sperm can be produced cheaply and in great number, male investment in child bearing is low. Female investment, however, is significant: a large egg must be produced, and a long gestation period may be involved. This discrepancy leads to differences in male and female strategies regarding sex. Because males' genes stand to gain (and lose) more from competition, males are more likely to behave like high-stakes gamblers. In polygamous species, they fight, sometimes to the death, for females. The winners' genes are spread to many offspring, and the losers' genes are spread to none. Because females' reproductive rate is fixed by their ability to produce eggs, they stand to gain less from competition. They have more to gain from being picky in their choice of mates, and all sorts of female mate-selection strategies have developed as a result.
Before ending, I want to say a bit about the implications of Dawkins's book. The reviewer I mentioned earlier thinks that The Selfish Gene presents an "appallingly pessimistic view of human nature, and makes life seem utterly pointless." I disagree. First, as Dawkins points out, our behavior is only partially determined by our genes. We are self-aware, rational beings, which means we can question the proclivities our genes give us. We can even "rebel" against them. Dawkins uses contraception as a simple example--non-reproductive sex certainly isn't in our genes' interest. More importantly, we can choose to behave as true altruists. We aren't compelled to obey our genes' selfish dictates.
Life is only pointless if we think it is. We can create meaning as individuals and as a species. How we got here is irrelevant; we now have the power to direct our own destiny. I strongly recommend The Selfish Gene to anyone who wants to better understand their place in the universe.
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Summary: A classic of evolutionary explication, with speculations
Comment: Richard Dawkins has become famous in the public mind as one of the strongest exponents of contemporary evolutionary theory, as well as an opponent of religion and creationism. THE SELFISH GENE is the book that launched his career as a celebrity scientist.
Ostensibly it is devoted to addressing, and ultimately debunking, the idea of "group selection," or the nearly equivalent "altruism". What does natural selection actually select? The gene. Or more generally, a replicator, of which a gene is the pertinent example, while speculations on the nature of other possible replicators makes for interesting reading at the end of the book. The fact that genes are units of replication and thus selection is the defining principle of "neo-Darwinism," the combination of Darwin's pre-genetic understanding of evolution with Mendelian genetics. Dawkins pursues with logical rigor the implications of this understanding, clearing away a lot of confusions, particularly those centered around explicit or inadvertent assumptions of selection of individual organisms, groups of them, or whole species or ecosystems. Seeming examples of such "altruism"--one organism promoting another's welfare at its own expense--can often be explained as "kin selection," where one organism's genes promote the welfare of the identical genes in closely related organisms. In all cases, though, the gene is doing what is most effective in creating copies of itself.
Though Dawkins is addressing a specific, if widespread, confusion regarding evolutionary theory, his book also serves as a good general introduction to the topic. His language is clear, evocative, and often passionate, and his examples and metaphors are memorable. Mathematical concepts, such as the Prisoner's Dilemma, are explained clearly, without formulas or technical language. Quasi-philosophical speculations provide meaty food for thought. He introduces the now oft-referenced if seldom understood idea of the "meme," a unit of cultural reproduction. Also, in the thirtieth anniversary edition he provides a summary of the idea he develops in THE EXTENDED PHENOTYPE: that genes' actions on the environment do not end at the boundary of their organism's body, but act on other bodies and the physical world.
Some reviewers found this book a depressing read. This, I suspect, results from succumbing to "genetic determinism", which Dawkins avowedly rejects. When talking about humans, he notes that genes exert a strong statistical influence on our behavior, but not a completely irresistible one. For instance, there are the memes, replicators which evolve much more quickly than the gene. Yet our conscious minds can evaluate and choose to ignore even those. We can ignore the programming of genes (and memes), though it is a tough battle. THE SELFISH GENE helps us better understand what we're up against.
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Summary: Neo-Darwinian Genetic Evolution of Altruism and Social Behaviour that shook Group Selectionists
Comment: The first thing I will say about The Selfish Gene (TSG) is that it is not the first book on evolution you should read although as a Dawkins book it is not a bad choice but for those unfamiliar with both, then I would suggest Climbing Mount Improbable or The Blind Watchmaker first. Both of those books by Dawkins have a much broader, more generalized, look at natural selection and evolution.
TSG is an entirely different type of book because it is particularly academic and a very complex read on specific lines of reasoning that are even aimed at correcting the misconceptions of big name professional biologists. It assumes that the reader will be somewhat acquainted with Darwinism and evolution. If you are not then I would strongly urge that you pass on TSG until you do. In fact, you will bring much more to TSG and get much more out of it if you spend time on his above mentioned works first. I would also suggest Darwin's own "The Origin of Species" if you can.
The reason for doing this is that during the 1970s TSG entered midway into a battle within evolutionary theory to settle some disputes and to make this version of Darwinism accessible to the general reader. If you don't know much about why TSG was needed in the first place then I don't think it will make that much sense to read it now. If, however, you understand what is going on previous to it and how it is presently used, then TSG becomes mandatory reading but it is not like Dawkins other works except for maybe the sequel to TSG, The Extended Phenotype, that should be treated the same way as TSG and certainly not read before this very progressive book on evolution.
The Selfish Gene is a massive assault on evolutionary biologists who explained behaviour by using phrases like "for the good of the species". Dawkins and most of his English contemporaries from the time of R.A Fisher's "The Genetical Theory of Natural Selection" (1930) and the modern synthesis had difficulties in trying to explain altruism in terms of Darwinism, like why some organisms in the struggle for survival appear not to struggle for themselves but for other organisms. Many biologists aligned with the work of V. C. Wynne-Edwards on a mathematical model for group selection to explain this problem. This was a bold step away from Darwin's view, and the established scientific evolution model of the individual as the unit of selection, not the group. Darwin had speculated on group selection very briefly in The Descent of Man but to actually incorporate it into Darwinian evolution almost seemed contrary to natural selection. Yet the Wynne-Edwards math that groups could be selected was good on paper and so many believed that altruism could be solved this way.
What they didn't know was that an alternative explanation for altruism was emerging around the same time as the Wynne-Edwards model. This alternative explanation for altruism did not require group selection. This alternative was called Kin Selection and was developed by W.D Hamilton in a paper called The genetical evolution of social behaviour (1964). TSG can be best described as a book popularizing an explanation of Hamilton's discoveries. While Hamilton had found a very elegant solution to altruism it came with a price that Dawkins and many of his colleagues are asking us to take and in a way it's not entirely different from the leap that Wynne-Edwards wanted but this jump in evolutionary thought is certainly nowhere near as startling as group selection. The jump is this. We need to develop the concept of the individual as the unit of selection to include the gene.
There is much to favour the view that we should take a gene-centred view of evolution but Dawkins stresses that we are not really moving from the individual as the unit of selection at all, just seeing it in a new way. G. C. Williams in Adaptation and Natural Selection (1966) had already challenged group selection. So had the very influential Maynard Smith who was developing the ESS (evolutionary stable strategy) through game theory and applying it to evolution. E. O Wilson had just finished writing "Sociobiology" and was battling fellow scientists in his own university over whether we should really be subjecting human social behavior to the science of evolution. Dawkins TSG thus emerges in the middle of this poignant moment as a vehicle to see the matter of Hamilton's work firmly through to finish. For anyone interested in evolution, it is not only worth every bit of the effort, but mandatory reading.
It makes it all the more interesting that for such an important read there is very little Dawkins in TSG at all. In fact Dawkins writes significantly about everyone else in evolutionary thought except himself. He is like the Francis Bacon of the 20th century, extolling on so much and unselfishly on the work of others that he has little time to say much about his own thoughts on evolution except for the shortest chapter on the concept of the meme as a cultural example of natural selection at work outside of the gene.
There are two editions of TSG and the 30th anniversary edition with a new forward. It is important to at least get the second edition as there are two fresh new chapters spanning some extra 60 pages plus a fist of new notations at the back to explain his position more clearly, update us on current findings, correct some errors and validates some hypothesis as now theories. It is actually probably due another update. The first edition doesn't have this and the meme chapter was the chapter that closed the first edition of this book. Anyhow the 30th anniversary edition does it all.
Chapter 1 - Why are people?
Dawkins brings up morality in relation to Darwinism and defines altruism along with explaining the Darwinian version of behaviour. There is some basic outlines of natural selection and this books sets up the question of why altruism? Wynne-Edwards/Robert Ardrey/ Konrad Lorenz (although Lorenz gets lots of better press for other discoveries later in TSG) group selection is introduced as the alternative to individual selection (albeit wrongly as Dawkins notes). G. C. Williams's work is used to start countering group selection.
Chapter 2 - The Replicators
Dawkins describes how molecules build up in evolution, DNA replication and ideas of competition between replicators.
Chapter 3 - Immortal Coils
Dawkins looks at the origins of replication, A. G. Cairns-Smith's crystal hypothesis are given as possible candidates, DNA sequences in terms of genes are explained by analogy of books and pages, mutations are brought into the scene along with the unit of selection and the evolution of biological complexity. Peter Medawar's views on gene selection, death and cancer are intriguing.
Chapter 4 - The Gene Machine
Survival, multicellular life, genes and behaviour, communication between genes and behaviour, the emergence of consciousness, the brain as a supercomputer, evolving strategies launches TSG into the heart of its subject matter. Here Dawkins as ethologist gives specific examples of these in action. Insects and colonies are his speciality. Mimicry as a strategy is explained along with predator prey interactions.
Chapter 5: Aggression: Stability and the Selfish Machine
Developing more on predator prey interactions the terminology of `cost-benefit' brings us to Maynard Smith and his Evolutionary Stable Strategy (ESS) that governs behaviour. The ESS is a mind blowing package of evolutionary development that expands the field considerably. Organisms are pre-programmed biological units that are also pre-programmed to behave and respond to situations. This is all about the chance of pay-offs against losses. Various strategies are explained and given examples in nature. Applied game theory transforms Darwinism into a whole new dynamic. Dawkins talks about his mentor ethologist Niko Tinbergen.
Chapter 6: Genesmanship
Dawkins now moves onto Kin selection. At this stage in the book the reader will have to have their thinking cap on to follow through the strategies that become somewhat mathematical. It also looks at how genes compete or cooperate among themselves. The coefficient of relatedness is explained.
Chapter 7: Family Planning
This is about the evolution of parental care, population sizes, birth-rates and the ecology of David Lack. This is also aimed at dispensing with group selection.
Chapter 8: Battle of the Generations
Dawkins expands on parental care and stratagems related to it. R. L. Trivers gene concepts are brought into the picture and parental investment (P.I) is discussed along with parent-offspring conflicts. Zahavi is made known but plays a more important role later. Deception and deceptive traits are brought up so we can see the evolution of cheating.
Chapter 9: Battle of the Sexes
Now it is time for the evolution of sex and how to define sex, most it based on R.A Fisher's work. The role of the sexes becomes evident in that battle. Trivers is used to enlarge on it and again the gene plays a central role in understanding it. Zahavi's handicap principle will stimulate thoughts on sexual selection.
Chapter 10: You Scratch My Back I'll Ride On Yours
Hamilton's work is able to produce geometries that look like group selection based on selfish gene principles. Altruistic signals may even be selfish without invoking kin selection such as in cave theory and `never break rank'. Next comes what is maybe the hardest part of the book, the evolution of slave-making species with respect to sex ratios. Heads will be left spinning and even Dawkins says his is. The evolution of symbiosis is developed upon this and then the classic puzzle of the Prisoner's Dilemma is played out.
Chapter 11: Memes: The New Replicators
This is about the possibility that natural selection is not just limited to the gene and suggests that culture goes through a very similar selection process that becomes embedded in people's minds and is transmitted from brain to brain. These cultural memes can serve their own purpose and may not be to our benefit. Dawkins looks at religion and invokes memes as a possible explanation. The author is clear though that this is a hypothesis and is using it mostly to show how natural selection is not just limited to the gene. Effectively this chapter ended the first edition and Dawkins maintains that humans can fight against any selfish problems that we have to live a better life.
Chapter 12: Nice Guys Finish First
This is an addition and is part of the second edition. This is mostly about Robert Axelrod's experiments with the Prisoner's Dilemma and how it applies to biology and focuses on the tit-for-tat strategy and how it competes with others. Do you cooperate or do you defect? Great game theory.
Chapter 13: The Long Reach of the Gene
This is a synopsis of his second book The Extended Phenotype (EP). You could really drop this chapter and just pick up EP except that he does recap TSG for the last few pages so at least try to read that if you can. It will also give you a taste of. In a way this is not saying anything scientifically new about what phenotypes are and do except to add how the selfish gene extends outwards to interact with the environment and other organisms. Dawkins might be offering an innovative approach to dealing with biological evolution.
So, to sum it up, group selection is declared dead, Darwin's principles are still alive, the gene is perfectly compatible with evolution and this view brings much more.
TSG is a radically sweeping revolutionary evolutionary thought to see the gene as the unit of selection. Whatever you might think of this, one thing is for certain, the group selectionists didn't see the group rejectionists coming with TSG and even 30 years later haven't manage to displace the selfish gene view. What arguments they have had are as weak as the group selectionist model that they depended on. TSG makes a solid case that the alternative view from the gene strongly infers answers to altruism and may quicken the pursuit for the origins of evolution itself from the view of chemical replicators. For those who can accept it, this is probably the new face of evolution.
At the same time we should mention weaknesses as the argument does challenge the traditional concept of the unit of selection as the individual because in some cases the genes need not be in the individual. Apparently duplicate genes in another individual qualify and the concept even goes further to say genes helping other genes symbiotically as per EP are to be considered as part of individual. That's a very big thing to say. Yet Darwin didn't get the concept of genes when he described natural selection. Any scientist who takes the selfish gene very carefully by conserving the unit of selection as the individual would, quite frankly, be on the right side of Darwinian evolution and even the Neo-Darwinian movement of the modern synthesis... but is probably missing out on much. If someone says that the unit of selection is the individual, you cannot say they are wide of the mark, but it looks like they have to turn to the gene to explain certain instances of altruism. In TSG Dawkins is trying to say that they are the same thing However in his next book, EP, Dawkins clearly works to overthrow overemphasising the unit of selection as the individual. He even goes as far to say that it is wrong and gives reasons (such as meioses). The only true unit of selection is the replicator and in Dawkins view that can only mean the gene. What we really need to ask for now though is what is the evidence for the selfish gene?
In reality the evidence for models outside of the individual as the unit of selection are quite scant, but the gene as unit of selection does have direct evidence to support it. The evidence for group selection is controversial and after 30 years they haven't made much ground. Simply put, there doesn't appear to be much of a debate anymore even if some group selectionists make some noise (it looks like they just don't understand the concept of kin selection). There is evidence for the selfish gene but does this mean we should accept the revaluation of the unit of selection to include the gene? It appears we should. As a note, group selectionists need to do a lot better to try and match this kind of quality science and do not do themselves one bit of justice by trying to discredit it with scare-tactics and ambiguity. Saying things like every other possible unit of selection except for the gene can be the unit of selection doesn't help anything.
We have one other question to ask. Does the selfish gene model include all genetic information and does all behaviour need to invoke the selfish gene? I can't help but remember that even Dawkins shows how Hamilton didn't have to invoke gene selection to explain altruism in terms of the individual as the unit selection. Imagine if all altruism was explained this way. The selfish gene might be relegated to a very small minor role in evolution. You are best to reserve judgement on how far reaching the selfish gene model actually is until you look more at EP. EP really is where the argument is at, but TSG helps set up the basic premise that the gene view of evolution is the answer to many outstanding questions in evolution.
Another thing to note is that creationists have never been able to produce an alternative science to this model. No matter how they may critic it, complain wrongly that it is genetic determinism or dislike his use of metaphors, they cannot refute the math in his cited peer-review nor can they offer a substitute science.
Not to end with a critic I would like to add that TSG is quite possibly the most important book on evolution next to Fisher's "The Genetical Theory of Natural Selection" which is only trumped by Darwin's publications. I don't think I am wrong with that praise.
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Editorial Reviews:
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Richard Dawkins' brilliant reformulation of the theory of natural selection has the rare distinction of having provoked as much excitement and interest outside the scientific community as within it. His theories have helped change the whole nature of the study of social biology, and have forced thousands of readers to rethink their beliefs about life.
In his internationally bestselling, now classic volume, The Selfish Gene, Dawkins explains how the selfish gene can also be a subtle gene. The world of the selfish gene revolves around savage competition, ruthless exploitation, and deceit, and yet, Dawkins argues, acts of apparent altruism do exist in nature. Bees, for example, will commit suicide when they sting to protect the hive, and birds will risk their lives to warn the flock of an approaching hawk.
This 30th anniversary edition of Dawkins' fascinating book retains all original material, including the two enlightening chapters added in the second edition. In a new Introduction the author presents his thoughts thirty years after the publication of his first and most famous book, while the inclusion of the two-page original Foreword by brilliant American scientist Robert Trivers shows the enthusiastic reaction of the scientific community at that time. This edition is a celebration of a remarkable exposition of evolutionary thought, a work that has been widely hailed for its stylistic brilliance and deep scientific insights, and that continues to stimulate whole new areas of research today.
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